If you saw the quicklook you know how crazy ship designs can get, so i was hoping I could see what some other duders have been building.

I downloaded the free version, and it's awesome so I'll probably get the full game. I'll update with my ships if I do.

Trying out the demo at the moment...I'll probably pick up the full version soon.

EDIT: Bought it now...time to get busy building!

@Vexxan said:

Trying out the demo at the moment...I'll probably pick up the full version soon.

EDIT: Bought it now...time to get busy building!

I built such absurd rocketships in the demo, you have so much more variety in your parts with the full game, especially with mods.

So this started off as an X-Wing space plane thing, but after some considerable trial and mostly error I gave up on that and went with a rocket.

It might not look like it, but it's extremely stable. The capsule at the top is equipped with parachutes and struts to make a nice little lander. The problem is it only gets about halfway to the moon. That's probably due primarily to very poor fuel management. I could probably add one more fuel tank for one good burn in space before separating. The weight shouldn't suffer too much from it.

I know I need to lose the intakes on those SRB's...I just thought they looked neat. Well aware they serve no purpose and probably add a bit of drag.

I'm definitely going to have to check out some mods. Feeling a bit creatively limited sometimes. Although I like the challenge of making something ridiculous out of little or nothing.

Here is a slightly different version at the end of its flight. Flew clean past the Mun's orbit. Some more careful piloting could possibly get me there.

Not a big fan of those little wings. They REALLY mess with RCS, as they seem to make the rocket spin like a top.

I have yet to make a ship that doesn't crash back down to earth.

And if I could, how would I even navigate to my way to the moon.

@Devil240Z said:

I have yet to make a ship that doesn't crash back down to earth.

And if I could, how would I even navigate to my way to the moon.

You have to get in to orbit. The KSP wiki on their website has tutorials on how to enter orbit and how to get to the moon.

@NoRemnants said:

@Devil240Z said:

I have yet to make a ship that doesn't crash back down to earth.

And if I could, how would I even navigate to my way to the moon.

You have to get in to orbit. The KSP wiki on their website has tutorials on how to enter orbit and how to get to the moon.

are you kidding me? those tutorials are like a physics class. They don't speak in plain english. I just wish there were a basic design for a ship that can break atmo that I could copy and tweak to learn the game.

I just did it by copying the pics from this thread!

FINALLY, ive stranded an astronaut in space. Jebediah you sacrifice is heroic.

@Devil240Z said:

@NoRemnants said:

@Devil240Z said:

I have yet to make a ship that doesn't crash back down to earth.

And if I could, how would I even navigate to my way to the moon.

You have to get in to orbit. The KSP wiki on their website has tutorials on how to enter orbit and how to get to the moon.

are you kidding me? those tutorials are like a physics class. They don't speak in plain english. I just wish there were a basic design for a ship that can break atmo that I could copy and tweak to learn the game.

I just did it by copying the pics from this thread!

FINALLY, ive stranded an astronaut in space. Jebediah you sacrifice is heroic.

I found a fantastic tutorial on basic orbiting, if you don't care about exact, NASA-esque percision, then do what the video tells you to do. The wiki tutorial is awful. I watched that video and was able to quickly put up 2 large orbiters in circular orbits around Kerbin. That youtube channel also has tutorials on going to the moon, theres a thread on the KSP forum about it here.

As for Jebediah, you can't leave him out there! Save him!!! If you think going to the mun is hard, you haven't tried getting two rockets to meet in deep space yet. Its a fun challenge, i came damn close trying to save one of my dudes, but that was before I had even gotten orbits down.

Here's my fancy new solar collector space station/orbiter thing. I highly recommend the truss pack if you want some nice looking parts.

@Mikemcn: I found this series of videos by this guy called chickenkeeper on youtube. Ive learned quite a bit from him.

Those are some neat ship styles. I love building stuff, but I don't have the money just yet to shell out for it. However, the content shared here and the quick-look keep pushing me closer.

Here is my first Ship that has reached Space. I Reached Space with 4 Liquid fuel containers a Liquid fuel rocket and 2 Solid fuel rockets. But the ship keept leaning during the first stage ( solid fuel stage ) so I added 2 more. and now it dosent lean as much. they still get me to about 10,000 m before they burn out. I dont know how fast they got me before, or how fast they get me now. Before I quit the game last I also added a liquid container, and a liquid jet in the top section. Because burning all the fuel in the lower part of the ship gets the ship on a escape path out of the solar system. And I want to be able to return.

@Mikemcn: That tutorial video has the most soothing tutorial music I've ever heard.

@heatDrive88 said:

@Mikemcn: That tutorial video has the most soothing tutorial music I've ever heard.

I know! it's great, thats part of what i loved about it.

@Dagbiker: if you have leaning troubles, just throw an advanced SAS and some fins on it Once you're in orbit the weight won't be a problem.

@Mikemcn That video about orbits was rather helpful. I was able to get into orbit around Kerbin before but it was always ugly elliptical orbits but not any more.

This is what I'm using to practice getting into and adjusting orbits.

I should have taken more screenshots earlier, but here's the ship I crashed into the Mun with:

Or at least what was left of it after the launch stage(s).

So today's mission was land on the Mun successfully with the lander addon I got.

I built the lander up and through some considerable trial and error finally managed a ship design that I liked which also had enough stages to get me to the moon and possibly back.

The first challenge I met was getting this big son of a bitch off the planet. The first time I tried I was conserving fuel running at about 2/3 throttle during launch. It got just out of the atmosphere but even after jettisoning the SRBs, I didn't have enough power to lift all that weight. Fell right back down like a brick.

The next try (after a few tweaks for stability) was full throttle all the way from the start. Got into space just fine with plenty of fuel to spare. Unfortunately I wasn't going anywhere near the right direction to get to the Mun.

Next try I made sure to launch at a time when I could actually shoot straight for it. Everything went fairly flawlessly. Took some figuring out trying to line up properly to the moon and slow down enough not to skip right past it. As I approached it occurred to me that I blew through all my RCS fuel by leaving it on when I didn't actually need it. So I was stuck slowly trying to nudge the ship around without it. That sort of took my attention off the more pressing matter - the fact that I was flying towards the surface too fast.

I tried to flip it around and slow down but before doing so had the bright idea to drop my last heavier rocket stage, forgetting the fact that the lander's wimpy descent engine couldn't possibly slow me down enough on it's own even at full blast.

1500m/s, 1200, 950, POOF...bye bye lander.

I'll give it another shot later on. I'm wondering if I should devote an entire stage to reverse engines of some kind. I don't know if I could deal with the added weight and drag of them and fuel. Clearly landing will be much more of a challenge than the trip, but I'm pretty pleased with how close I managed to get without consulting tutorials and whatnot. Not that there's anything wrong with that.

I've been having 2 problems that I don't remember running into when playing earlier builds of the game. The first is that my rockets almost always hit "turbulence" at 7,000 and 12,000 meters (sometimes 4,000), where it just starts shaking. Usually enough to shake the whole thing apart. The second is a strange tendency for solid rocket boosters to work perfectly fine until they're JUUUUUST about out of fuel, at which point they shoot straight up through the components stacked above it (those parts usually being a decoupler, engine and liquid fuel tanks, resulting in the whole thing exploding).

I'd really like to be able to launch a rocket without it flying up its own ass when the solid boosters run dry or rattling to pieces the moment it breaks through one layer of the atmosphere.

@BBAlpert said:

I've been having 2 problems that I don't remember running into when playing earlier builds of the game. The first is that my rockets almost always hit "turbulence" at 7,000 and 12,000 meters (sometimes 4,000), where it just starts shaking. Usually enough to shake the whole thing apart. The second is a strange tendency for solid rocket boosters to work perfectly fine until they're JUUUUUST about out of fuel, at which point they shoot straight up through the components stacked above it (those parts usually being a decoupler, engine and liquid fuel tanks, resulting in the whole thing exploding).

I'd really like to be able to launch a rocket without it flying up its own ass when the solid boosters run dry or rattling to pieces the moment it breaks through one layer of the atmosphere.

Advanced SAS and lots more SAS will help your turbulence. In theory.

I have a base rocket design I used and change whats on top. However when I was useing it with a long top it wobbly around more and then would start doing flips. I shortened it and it works fine. I even threw more SAS to make sure.

So instead of

------------------------

Take the parts and place them radially.

=====

To reduce length and wobble. Hope you understand.

As for Boosters rockets I have know clue. I try to use Solid boosters as little as possible, never on my main body, always on the outside.

This game is amazing and rewards people crazy enough to ask the questions we dare not to like "Can we really strap 50 rockets to an aluminium box"?

Godspeed you beautiful bastards.

@Akyho said:

@BBAlpert said:

I've been having 2 problems that I don't remember running into when playing earlier builds of the game. The first is that my rockets almost always hit "turbulence" at 7,000 and 12,000 meters (sometimes 4,000), where it just starts shaking. Usually enough to shake the whole thing apart. The second is a strange tendency for solid rocket boosters to work perfectly fine until they're JUUUUUST about out of fuel, at which point they shoot straight up through the components stacked above it (those parts usually being a decoupler, engine and liquid fuel tanks, resulting in the whole thing exploding).

I'd really like to be able to launch a rocket without it flying up its own ass when the solid boosters run dry or rattling to pieces the moment it breaks through one layer of the atmosphere.

Advanced SAS and lots more SAS will help your turbulence. In theory.

I have a base rocket design I used and change whats on top. However when I was useing it with a long top it wobbly around more and then would start doing flips. I shortened it and it works fine. I even threw more SAS to make sure.

So instead of

------------------------

Take the parts and place them radially.

=====

To reduce length and wobble. Hope you understand.

As for Boosters rockets I have know clue. I try to use Solid boosters as little as possible, never on my main body, always on the outside.

Also, adding those little wings that shift around are good if you want to remove some wobble. I found that if you add enough, the sheer momentum of the wings moving in unison is enough to make the rocket adjust side to side and as a result puts way less stress on your SAS which is something you will need once you get out of atmosphere. Also, I never use solid boosters. I'd rather take the extra weight if it means I can have a rocket that puts out more thrust and allows me to adjust thrust. Also, thrust vectoring is pretty useful once you get into thinner atmosphere/orbit. It will give you more bang for your buck when tying it to an SAS system.

@BBAlpert said:

I've been having 2 problems that I don't remember running into when playing earlier builds of the game. The first is that my rockets almost always hit "turbulence" at 7,000 and 12,000 meters (sometimes 4,000), where it just starts shaking. Usually enough to shake the whole thing apart. The second is a strange tendency for solid rocket boosters to work perfectly fine until they're JUUUUUST about out of fuel, at which point they shoot straight up through the components stacked above it (those parts usually being a decoupler, engine and liquid fuel tanks, resulting in the whole thing exploding).

I'd really like to be able to launch a rocket without it flying up its own ass when the solid boosters run dry or rattling to pieces the moment it breaks through one layer of the atmosphere.

Regarding rocket stability, just slap some struts(?) on the components that are rattling around. In case I got the name wrong, they look like the fuel line except they're gray instead of yellow.

I've also run into the issue of first-stage SRBs shooting up my rocket's ass. The trick is to wait a second or two after the SRB burns out completely. Disengaging that stage early means that the SRB is travelling faster that the rest of the rocket, causing it to mess you up.

@Dagbiker said:

Here is my first Ship that has reached Space. I Reached Space with 4 Liquid fuel containers a Liquid fuel rocket and 2 Solid fuel rockets. But the ship keept leaning during the first stage ( solid fuel stage ) so I added 2 more. and now it dosent lean as much. they still get me to about 10,000 m before they burn out. I dont know how fast they got me before, or how fast they get me now. Before I quit the game last I also added a liquid container, and a liquid jet in the top section. Because burning all the fuel in the lower part of the ship gets the ship on a escape path out of the solar system. And I want to be able to return.

I got a ship based on this one to the Mun, and eventually landed on the Mun.

Here's my awesome spaceplane. I used C7 plane parts. I can take it to space before running out of fuel. The cockpit has SAS to stabilize it, a coupler to separate it, and a parachute. I can save my little dude!

This thing actually worked. I then had a cool plane in space, fully fueled. You really need those wires. Also, I used Down Under Aerospace fuel tanks and C7 plane parts.

This a shot from another thread. As you can see I have four massive engines attached to 4 tanks on the outside and one tank in the middle. This is simply a power house desing to get things into space. I fly straight up or else it will be destroyed on a proper gravity run. Then turn an burn for an orbit.

@bananaz said:

Here's my awesome spaceplane. I used C7 plane parts. I can take it to space before running out of fuel. The cockpit has SAS to stabilize it, a coupler to separate it, and a parachute. I can save my little dude!

I've been experimenting with planes as well. Haven't managed to get one far enough out into orbit. Even with ridiculous rocket-assisted launch setups stopping just short of a space shuttle (because it isn't enough of a "plane" for me) I keep running out of fuel either on the way to space or in space too low to actually orbit the planet.

One of my earlier efforts was an extremely high altitude flight halfway around the world, I've been working on improving that. I'm almost tempted to see if I can expand that to a low-power glider that I can fly around the planet in atmosphere.

Here's my latest jet. It's actually a bit heavy to get off the ground on it's own with the jet engines, so I added four SRBs that can be fired and jettisoned in stages. Also I managed to build up and practice a system for landing (using the parachutes near the tail fins to stop) and emergency ejecting.

Edit* I just watched a video of how to properly build a space plane and get it into orbit and yeah, I've been going about some of this ALL wrong.

This is the rocket I used to go to the second moon, Minmus. I was having a fun little "space race" with a few friends of mine to see who could get to the moons first, so there's a complete album on imgur that shows the entire trip if you're interested. I also have an album of my trip to Mun with a very similar rocket here. One thing people forget is that when you're leaving one of the moons to come back, you don't need a ton of power until the planet pulls you into its orbit again, and from there you can just initiate a retrograde burn (reverse) to slow yourself down. Of course, now that I've been to both moons, some of the fun is gone, but it's not like I'm at a loss for games to play at the moment.

Another tip as far as executing a retrograde burn, or any burn, is concerned is to learn how to read the gimbal. The green circle indicates the direction you are currently heading, and the green circle with the X through it indicates the exact opposite of the direction you are heading.

@troidy said:

This is the rocket I used to go to the second moon, Minmus. I was having a fun little "space race" with a few friends of mine to see who could get to the moons first, so there's a complete album on imgur that shows the entire trip if you're interested. I also have an album of my trip to Mun with a very similar rocket here. One thing people forget is that when you're leaving one of the moons to come back, you don't need a ton of power until the planet pulls you into its orbit again, and from there you can just initiate a retrograde burn (reverse) to slow yourself down. Of course, now that I've been to both moons, some of the fun is gone, but it's not like I'm at a loss for games to play at the moment.

Another tip as far as executing a retrograde burn, or any burn, is concerned is to learn how to read the gimbal. The green circle indicates the direction you are currently heading, and the green circle with the X through it indicates the exact opposite of the direction you are heading.

My advise.....make up new challenges. Make some Satellites for Kerbin and the moons. Then a space station. Then Bases on the moons.

@Akyho said:

@troidy said:

This is the rocket I used to go to the second moon, Minmus. I was having a fun little "space race" with a few friends of mine to see who could get to the moons first, so there's a complete album on imgur that shows the entire trip if you're interested. I also have an album of my trip to Mun with a very similar rocket here. One thing people forget is that when you're leaving one of the moons to come back, you don't need a ton of power until the planet pulls you into its orbit again, and from there you can just initiate a retrograde burn (reverse) to slow yourself down. Of course, now that I've been to both moons, some of the fun is gone, but it's not like I'm at a loss for games to play at the moment.

Another tip as far as executing a retrograde burn, or any burn, is concerned is to learn how to read the gimbal. The green circle indicates the direction you are currently heading, and the green circle with the X through it indicates the exact opposite of the direction you are heading.

My advise.....make up new challenges. Make some Satellites for Kerbin and the moons. Then a space station. Then Bases on the moons.

I have a rocket that i think could get to the moon, but i just keep throwing bigger things into orbit around kerbin, i need to expand my horizons. I also need a bit more practice with orbits, i finally learned prograde and retrograde at least.

So I've been busy trying out a bunch of mods and whatnot. Here's a few things I put together.

X-Wing:

Gallery

Made with the Damn Robotics mod for the hinges that allow the wings to fold in and out.

REALLY a pain to fly, and it has to take off vertically. I want to put together a space version, but It can be difficult working with those hinges and heavier weight/more thrust. Maybe editing .cfg files in the mod can make stronger versions.

Dragster:

With a few variations using retro rockets as a sort of turbo I managed a top speed of about 420m/s over land. I need a mod with better wheels than the landing gear, but the wheels I'd like are locked up in this Nova Punch Remix licencing nonsense.

Fighter Jet:

Might not look like much, but it flies almost perfectly for a fairly long distance in atmosphere. With MechaJeb's Instrument Landing System set to maintain heading and altitude you can set it and forget it...until it runs out of fuel of course. Especially considering I built in no ejection system yet. Although I landed the thing with no fuel left, so as long as you're over flat land that's not too much of a problem either.

Munar Lander/Buggy:

So eventually I managed to brute force my way to the Mun with little more than a few tips on how to get into orbit and expand it to intersect. I even managed a safe landing...with no fuel to get back home though. With that under my belt I started messing around with MechaJeb. MAN...forget the whole "cheating" idea, MechaJeb is awesome.

After reading up on some KSP rocket science and doing some testing with MechaJeb features I eventually built a new, more intelligently-designed ship featuring a custom-built lander built with parts of the Truss Pack and some wheels that allowed driving via translation controls. It actually made it to the moon and back without much trouble.

I'll post more about that later.

TIE Advanced:

Update - I fixed the problem with balance and actually managed to make it look a whole hell of a lot better too...which was tough. Now the problem is getting it into a decent orbit. There's kind of nowhere to put fuel on this thing without it immediately throwing off balance or looking like crap. I'll probably just upgrade its launch SRB's to ones that get it through most of the gravity roll.

@Akyho: Currently trying to colonize the Mun. Made a lander with a crewtank as the bottom portion. Land on the moon, detach and then take back off leaving the crew tank on the ground like a little house. I want to get a little settlement going there and then start dropping Kerbals off for longer stays. Also working on a large lander with several crew tanks to act as an emergency evacuation ship.

I'm going to try and post some .18 ships, Stations and Satellites for everyone!!!